I'm a Genius
by Spidermunkee
Summary: What if Lance was a lot smarter than he let on? What if because of his brain, he landed in the Fighter Pilot class? And then headed to Kerberos with Shiro?
1. Chapter 1

"Lance!"

Lance jerked his head up, doodles forgotten in the face of Iverson's snarl. The whole class snickered at him and he felt his neck flush. "Yes, sir?"

"I asked what the sun's radius is."

"Oh, uh, six point nine six times ten to the power of eight meters." Iverson stared at him for a long moment, the curl in his lip prominent in his disgust.

"That is correct, however instead of wasting my time to ask again, I suggest you pay attention. Or your dreams of being on the Kerberos mission will be just that: dreams." Lance's neck flushed again as some students tittered at him. Keith, bless his soul, just quirked his mouth in a parody of a smile. Lance grimaced back at him and watched as Keith turned away to laugh into his fist.

"Dude," Keith exclaimed twenty minutes later, walking down the hall, "You really need to start paying attention. People are starting to ask questions -"

"I know, I know, pay attention so that if I get a super complicated question right, I can pay it off as extra studying… it's just so boring!" Lance threw his hands into the air, sighing through his nose with so much force he thought he'd faint for a moment. Keith knocked shoulders with him.

"Just pretend like you're paying attention at least," he snorted. "We can't all be geniuses like you, so maybe seeing you suffer throughout the day will help everyone get motivated."

"Yeah, but they don't know I'm a genius, so really it'd just be _you_ getting motivated, and you're my rival, so nope, not trying to motivate you!"

Keith moved to dodge Lance's flailing arms, but Lance followed and managed to smack him in the shoulder. He grinned at Keith and started walking faster. "Oi!" Keith hollered, giving chase. Lance weaved in and out of students, giggling manically inside of his head. It was so fun to provoke Keith into losing his cool - the guy needed it sometimes. He was always so wound up, like a demented toy soldier, focused on making Shiro proud and being the best pilot. Lance mused that if he wasn't as smart, he'd likely find Keith's unrelenting focus a threat to his standing. Because while Lance didn't want the others to know he was a genius, he still wanted to be seen as smart and capable. Keith, if he wasn't such a good friend, would have been his first enemy.

Lance counted himself fortunate to recognize how lonely Keith was. It enabled him to make an effort to know the boy, to get under his skin and see all of the potential just hidden and waiting to strike.

And strike it did -

Lance yelped as Keith came around the corner and smacked into him, grabbing his shoulders and pinning him to the wall, smirk wide and smug. "Okay, okay, laugh it up. Now take me to food," Lance grunted, swatting Keith's hands away. Keith whistled and walked next to him with his hands behind his head. Lance resisted the urge to trip him. It was hard, but he was a genius, nothing was impossible.

"So when is the test for the mission?"

Lance hummed in response, hands above his butt, arching his back to hear that relieving pop. "Tomorrow," he answered, pleased to hear Keith choke on air.

"Dude, will you be ready?" he asked, grabbing Lance's shoulder.

Lance allowed the contact for a few seconds then smoothly slid away. "You do know who you're talking to, right?"

Keith snorted. "Right. It's just hard to remember, y'know, since you don't pay attention in class."

Lance, for lack of a better word, pouted. Keith pretended to shield his eyes and Lance snorted. "Yeah, yeah, laugh it up. I'll ace that exam."

"Are you sure that's a good idea?" Keith asked, suddenly serious. Lance stilled.

"No," he admitted. "I know that I can't afford it. I'll just score a ninety percent."

"Maybe that's still -"

"Keith, I know that you're worried, but buddy, c'mon. I know what I'm doing." Keith watched him with his unusual violet eyes, as still as a lion before their prey. Lance still couldn't get used to how focused Keith could get; his eyes burned, like twin dragon flames before a forest fire. Lance was almost intimidated, but he'd never been afraid of fire, so he wouldn't start now. "I know you're worried, but I've planned it all out. What do you think I was doing in class?"

The fire dimmed. "Yeah, I know, but this late in the game - I just don't want them to figure it out," Keith admitted, looking away. Lance preened at him.

"Aw, you _are_ worried about me! Who knew how much you cared!"

Keith started walking faster, but Lance had long legs and kept up easily. He continued to tease until they hit the mess hall, sure Keith would snap at any second. Before he could, a hand grasped his shoulder. Keith watched as Lance's pupils became pinpricks and how he stiffened up -

"You're Lance, right?"

then how he visibly shook himself to swat the hand away.

"Yeah," he answered easily, turning around to see kind brown eyes and a perfect cupid's bow curved into an uncertain smile, large hand falling to his side. "At your service, Mr…"

"Oh, right, I'm Takashi Shirogane, but you can call me Shiro." Like Lance didn't know who _the_ Takashi Shirogane was. He still had the dude's poster hung up by his bed. Keith teased him relentlessly when he found out, but he couldn't bring himself to remove it. "I've wanted to meet you for a long time," Shiro admitted, raising a hand to clasp the back of his neck, the very picture of bashful. "Keith told me a lot about you, so the curiosity was starting to eat me alive. I didn't mean to startle you," he added, glancing into Lance's eyes. "Sorry."

Lance smirked at him. "It's all good, Super Soldier. It's good to meet you, too, Keith always turns into a puppy every time he talks about you -"

"I _do not!_ " Keith protested vehemently.

Lance grinned at him, "Methinks doth protest too much."

Keith literally growled at him, the fire in his eyes back to blazing at full force. Shiro laughed beside him, eyes glowing similarly to Keith's, except there was a certain lightness to Shiro that made Lance want to stare. "Methinks so, too," Shiro said, grinning at Keith's red ears.

"Oh, this is just adorable," Lance cackled, yelping and ducking as Keith took a swing at him. "Hey, Keithmeister, watch the face, it's a money maker!"

"Like anyone would pay to look at _your_ ugly mug!" Keith snarled.

"You're hot when you're riled up -"

" _Lance!_ "

The only thing Shiro could do was laugh.

/

Shiro waited with Keith while Lance took the test. While it was never calming to hang around his pseudo little brother, it was always soothing. Keith was such a firecracker, and the silence between them crackled with unbridled tension. Shiro's soul basked in the unnamed energy Keith always exuded. "Are you worried?" he asked when the silence when from comforting to stifling.

"Nah," Keith answered, stretching and settling back against the wall. "Lance has this in the bag. You should get used to his presence now because he's for sure going to be the one to go with you all."

"That sure, are you?" Shiro asked with amusement.

"You've seen his record, right?"

"Yeah," he admitted, recalling his bemusement at how all of Lance's grades were the same number in every class. He'd just assumed that it was a coincidence, but there was no way a coincidence could get a ninety in every. Single. Class. "He's done that on purpose, hasn't he?"

Keith let the question hang in the air, staring at the door. Shiro turned to Keith. "He's really smart, isn't he?" Keith didn't answer. "You promised not to tell, didn't you?"

Keith nodded once, short. Shiro huffed a laugh. "Yeah, I'm not worried anymore. Guess I'll just have to hang around him from now on."

"You'll regret saying those words," Keith snarked.

"I thought you liked him?"

Keith snorted, waving away strands of hair from his face. "It's not a question of like, but of tolerance. There's only so much Lance in one day that a person can take."

Beside himself, Shiro threw his head back and laughed. "I am so happy you found him," he chuckled. "It's good to see you have a friend."

Watching as Keith's ears turned red, Shiro pinched one. "Hey," Keith reprimanded, knocking him away. "I didn't find him, he found me and stuck to me like an octopus. Stop laughing, it's not funny!"

It was so funny, Shiro thought. Imagining Lance with four arms and four legs, attaching himself to Keith and not letting go despite Keith jumping around and smacking him - he peeled into laughter again. "I haven't seen you so lively since -" he cut himself off, chuckles diminishing. "It's just good to see you connecting with someone other than me," he finished lamely, hand behind his head.

Keith managed a brief smile at him, tight and uncomfortable, but still as warm as the sun lighting up the night. The tightness around Shiro's heart that came with mentioning anything to do with Keith's past unraveled. "I get it," Keith said. "I guess I just got used to having him around."

"I'm glad you did," Shiro said. He made it a personal quest to get to know Lance at that moment, seeing a light in Keith's eyes that wasn't there before. He also wanted to explore Lance's unquestionable mind, if his records really indicated what he thought they did. "So did you find a girlfriend yet?"

The choking noise Keith made was music to his ears.

/

"Dude, ninety percent!" Lance crowed, waving his score in Keith's face. It took all of Keith's willpower to not grab the paper and rip it into shreds. Sometimes he couldn't wait until Lance was gone. "Hey man, you okay?"

Sometimes Keith really wanted Lance to stay, he amended when the exuberance dimmed and concern leaked out. "Nothing's wrong, Dork," he snorted. Seriously, when Lance wasn't being all super smart, he really was such a dork. The guy was a super nerd about space - which was a good thing, considering space was his profession - and he hit on anything with two legs. "I just don't know how you're going to handle all of your fangirling over Shiro." He had to smirk after that, just waiting for the inevitable blow up.

"I am not _fangirling_ over _Shiro!_ " Lance shrieked, then paused, eyes unfocused and head cocked. "Is fangirling really a word?"

 _Total dork_ , Keith mused.

"Why wouldn't you?" a voice interrupted. They both looked over the hall to see a large guy eyeing them curiously, black hair framing the orange headband on his forehead. "He's literally the best pilot to grace these halls. I don't think I could even speak if I was in his presence," the guy continued, fingers rubbing his chin. Lance started walking over to him and Keith almost smacked himself in the face. Sure, Lance could see things about people most couldn't, but the guy really could be too trusting.

"Who are you?" Lance asked, stopping about a foot away from the big guy. Lance was tall (shut up, Keith was only three inches shorter) and even his nose fell below the guy's lips.

"Hunk," the guy said, starting to lean back but thinking better of it and putting his hand out to shake. Lance paused for a moment, and Keith was about to step in, but he stood straighter and grasped Hunk's hand, dropping it quickly.

"Lance," he said, grinning unabashedly to ease the crease between Hunk's brows at the fast display. Hunk's eyes turned to Keith curiously.

"Keith," he said shortly, frowning.

Hunk's eyes widened and he stuttered, finally able to shoot out a quick sentence once Lance started to really get into the guy's face. "You're Keith Kogane!" Lance stepped back quickly, as if he saw a snake right under his foot. Keith smirked at him when he turned to glare.

"Oi, and I'm Lance McClain!" he shouted, arms cross. _Your butthurt is showing,_ Keith snickered to himself. It was always good to get one up on Lance sometimes. The guy was too prideful in his genius. Taking him down a notch was one of Keith's favorite pastimes.

"Sorry, man," Hunk offered, "I've never heard of you."

"This is blasphemy!" Lance cried, back of hand shooting to his forehead so fast he smacked himself. "Ow," he muttered, before pretend swooning. Keith laughed at him. "You don't laugh, betrayer," he growled, pointing a manicured finger in Keith's general direction, face still tilted towards the ceiling. Hunk increasingly looked like he wanted to be anywhere but there.

"So, well, I'm going to -"

"Hey, Hunk, we're headed to the mess hall," Lance interrupted, straightening up from his downward tilting pose. "You wanna come?"

"And eat those MREs?" Hunk scoffed. "I can cook up something so much better."

"Great!" Lance exclaimed, grasping Keith by his jacket sleeve. "You don't mind cooking something for Keith and I, yeah?"

Hunk looked into the full force of Lance's grin and faltered, glancing to Keith for help only to see Keith giving him a miniature Lance Grin. One of Hunk's idols was smiling at him and he was helpless but to obey. "Yeah, sure. If you want to come with me out of the Garrison - unless you have something else to do."

"Nope!" Lance chirped, grinning. Keith almost felt guilty for using the guy's obvious idol crush against him, but man, something other than MREs? Keith felt all of his guilt disappear.

"Man," Lance sighed happily a little while later. "I wonder what I would do if I wasn't in the fighter class with you."

Keith snorted, leaning backward onto his bed. Lance plopped down in front of him, long legs stretching into Keith's space, like a kid that exclaimed to his mom that _I didn't touch him!_ but came _that_ close. "Probably suffer for MREs the entire time you're here and not get to go to Kerberos."

Lance stopped patting his stomach for a moment, grin falling away. "Yeah," he said quietly. Keith nudged him with a foot, ignoring how Lance stifled a flinch.

"Hey, man, you're in the fighter pilot class _and_ you're going to Kerberos," Keith scolded. "Don't start thinking about what-ifs right now, it'll just make you barf up your food baby."

Lance snorted. "Sorry, sorry, I'll start thinking of something else."  
"Should be easy to do," Keith grinned. Lance grinned back.

"Super easy. I _am_ a genius, after all."


	2. Chapter 2

"Careful now," Samuel Holt admonished his son, grasping his shoulder to steady him. "This ice is delicate."

"Isn't this fun, Lance?" Matt Holt asked, voice small and reverent, eyes greedily watching the ice slowly slide out of the hydraulic soil sampler, sleek and so clear it was like a glass window. Matt found it fascinating.

Lance laughed nearby, eyes on the horizon. "I think it's more fun to look at this view," his voice crackled through the comms, tracing the craters and stars in the far distance with a gloved finger. "Isn't it strange how bright it is here? The sun's rays just don't know when to quit."

"I'm going to have to agree with Lance," Shiro said, the grin evident in his voice. "I'm afraid looking at ice is a bit too boring for me."

Matt shrugged. "Your loss," he remarked.

"I don't -"

Lance interrupted Shiro, "What is _that?!_ "

Matt and his father paused in what they were doing, looking up to a daunting sight. It was at least half as large as the moon they were on, purple and dark. Matt mused that if space allowed for sound, it would truly be deafening.

"This is impossible," his father breathed next to him, hand tightening on Matt's shoulder.

"Do you think they're friendly?" Matt asked, nervously watching the dark silhouette blotting out the stars. No one answered, too busy taking in something that should by all rights be a myth. Matt almost didn't breathe, afraid to destroy the careful silence analogous to the ship that descended upon the group. He felt like he was watching Jesus rise from his grave; impossible but full of hope, to know that there was something _more_ out there, a certainty that he would be able to explore if only he could find out how.

Matt squinted at a sudden movement, noticing how the major light towards the center of the ship was growing brighter and brighter -

" _Run!_ " Shiro yelled, jerking Matt to stand, dragging him away. "C'mon, _run!_ "

Matt looked back to watch as a beam of some type of energy (anti-matter? Or something from his childhood show _Star Trek_ , mentioning a heavy atom called a Naquadah that when fissioning it allowed for huge amounts of energy?) plowed into the ground. The moon shook and Matt stumbled in Shiro's grasp, feet slipping - up?

It wasn't his imagination - his feet were floating upwards and soon he was tumbling head over heels towards the massive ship, inside of the magenta beam. He tried calling out to his dad and crew members, but the comms had been reduced to static. All he could hear were his own sobs as he was rocketed towards the unknown.

/

The first thing Shiro was aware of was how much his head hurt. He felt like he'd been hit with a car, or that his head was split open with an axe. AKA, not fun. He tried cracking open his eyes a few times, but even the dimm purple lighting they were in sent nails into his retinas.

The voices that reached his ears weren't speaking a language he knew, and they were gravelly, menacing. Heart racing, struggling to understand, Shiro managed to fight off the pain and kept his eyes open.

Purple, he managed at first. All that he saw was black and purple. It hurt his eyes almost as much as his initial headache. It was bad enough that the space they were in was covered in black and purple with magenta undertones, but the aliens ( _aliens. Am I dreaming?_ ) were purple, too. Humanoid with fur like a dog's. A purple dog, to match the interior. Narcissistic aliens.

A narcissistic alien race that also knew how to FaceTime, apparently. The one on the screen - ugly and mean - was barking an order and the other was kneeling. After a final word, the kneeling alien stood and started on its way over to - well great, Lance was running his mouth now.

"Hey, uh, we're super peaceful," Lance stammered. Shiro would've sighed if it didn't bring attention to himself. The guy was a genius, and he was stammering to an alien that clearly had no idea what he was saying? "C'mon man, just let us go. We mean you no harm, take us to your leader? Anything?"

A snarl and then Shiro jerked in his captor's arms as an alien standing behind Lance hit him in the head with the butt of a gun. Lance's stutters stopped as sudden as they started and he fell to the floor in a heap. "Lance!" he gasped, then swallowed his voice, terrified eyes rushing to the tall one in front of him. Another snarl and Shiro collapsed, his last sight of glowing yellow eyes against purple skin.

/

Lance uncurled from his cramped position, back arching into a satisfying pop despite the pain on the back of his head. "Hey, Lance," he heard Shiro say, and then there were hands on him, lifting him despite how he stiffened.

"Don't -" he gasped, knocking the hands away and shifting so his back was to the metal wall. A pause.

"I knew you didn't like being touched, but this is more than just dislike," Shiro observed casually. Lance snorted at him.

"What gave you that idea?"

"Denying help when we're stuck in an alien ship kind of clued it in," Shiro said dryly, settling down next to him, thankfully - blessedly - not touching him. "Does it have anything to do with being as smart as you are?"

Lance knew this was Shiro's way of saving his sanity, talking about normal things, familiar things, while the world as he knew it had shifted and the ground pulled out from under him. Lance decided to humor him despite how curious (terrified) he was about where they were in the solar system now - if they still were in the solar system. "Some of it," he admitted, not seeing the harm in sharing some of his quirks. "Mostly it's because I'm a complete germaphobe. Right now I'm about to crawl out of my skin - I can't - um, so where do you think we are right now? Specifically in the ship?"

Shiro stared at him, most likely concerned about Lance's own sanity. He said, after a long minute, "We're probably in the center of the ship."

It was quiet except for Lance's agreeing hum.

He really wished that he had his towelettes with him so he could at least wipe his face and hands and the areas he'd touched. He could see the grime under his fingernails and to distract himself from how messy he was, he looked up to study Shiro. The guy wasn't doing too well, he had to admit. There was a soft grimace on his face, no doubt from a killer headache Lance could feel from where he sat - but that was most probably his own headache. He did get bashed in the head, after all. Dark bags hung under Shiro's eyes and a five o'clock shadow made him appear rough and scraggly.

"How long have I been out?" Lance asked, hand raising to rub his own prickly hair.

"Not much longer than me, but guessing by your appearance and how hungry I am, I'd assume at least a day and a half." Lance hummed noncommittally in response, hand dropping to his lap. "Let's just hope Matt and Commander Holt made it out," Shiro continued, running a hand through his hair.

Lance grimaced, recalling his fumbling hand slipping against the gloves of Commander Holt, watching as the man was jerked upwards, towards that impossible magnetic beam. Feeling his own weightlessness, grasping downwards and twirling through space, glimpsing Matt hurtling towards him, Shiro not far behind.

"I wouldn't count on it," he sighed. Shiro echoed the sigh, slinking down the wall further. "How long do you think it'll be before someone comes for us?"

A shrug. "I have no idea, you're the genius."

"Even a genius can be wrong," Lance frowned, eyes closing. Shiro didn't respond, likely to let Lance have his moment of introspection. A true genius would have taken in all impossibilities, even ones as crazy as aliens. Which, honestly, wasn't as crazy as it should be. They - Lance, Shiro and the Holts - were the first humans to venture out this far. It made sense that they were the first ones to come into contact with the unknown.

But with a ship this size, and how fast it approached Kerberos, this thing should have been able to hit Earth a lot faster than they could have flown in their shuttle. "Hey, Shiro," Lance said urgently, mind right on the cusp of something big. "How long before they figure out Earth is close by."

A tense silence and then Shiro was sitting up fully, eyes wide. "This? Is so not good," he breathed. "How do we get them to forget it?"

"Distract them?" Lance knew he was grasping at straws, but really this was the only thing he could think of that wasn't completely off the wall and impossible.

"How?"

"I don't know," Lance admitted, so close to banging his already hurting head against the wall. "I don't know," he repeated, a sting behind his eyes so sharp he had to close them. His throat clogged and he tried to swallow it down, to think of positives -

"Lance," Shiro whispered, scooting closer. His hand hovered right over Lance's hands, hesitant to touch but wanting to comfort. "Hey, it's going to be okay."

"I can't think," Lance gasped out frantically. "I can't think of anything to help!"

"Hey, hey, it's okay if you can't think," Shiro cooed, hand finally grasping the other's. Lance couldn't even bother feeling disgusted. "It's okay to be scared. You've been able to think of anything in any situation, haven't you? And you're so scared and it's making you panic. It's okay to not be able to think right now. It's okay to feel."

"I don't feel," Lance croaked. "I can't feel, don't make me feel."

"You have to feel, Lance." Shiro's voice had an undertone that Lance had never heard before. Not with his Mama or Keith or even Hunk, whom he grew close to in the few months leading up to the Kerberos mission. "Feeling makes you human, and right now I think being human is the only thing we have going for us."

He knew Shiro was trying to cheer him up, but at that moment Lance wished he was anything but human, had any mind but his own. Fear had a way of freezing the blood in his veins more effectively than getting dropped into a pot of liquid nitrogen. Moving through fear was nigh impossible, but seeing Shiro's steady demeanor crumble before him, seeing him work through his own fear to ease Lance's, managed to settle him somewhat.

"I'm sorry," he gasped, "I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to start panicking, I'll do better."

"Shh," Shiro whispered, gathering Lance to him. Despite the initial disgust he felt for someone touching him, crowding him, rubbing their germs on him, Lance settled into Shiro's arms. He hugged like a bear - not that Lance knew how a bear hugged, but he imagined this was how it felt; warm and safe and secure. Lance reciprocated, hands grazing biceps and then shoulders to curl around a thick neck, pulling Shiro's head to meet Lance's shoulder.

"You can cry," Lance murmured, "If you want, you can cry."

Shiro stiffened at first, but after a second or two his whole body shuddered like the rails under a train, and tears wet Lance's shirt. "Sorry," Shiro choked, and Lance's arms tightened, understanding now this pure need to comfort another person in a crisis.

"Don't be sorry," he said in response, voice still hoarse. "You can't be sorry anymore than I can't be sorry."

"Okay," Shiro said through his nose. "Okay."

Lance held him through it, and if Shiro felt the wetness on his own neck, he didn't mention it.

/

If there was one thing Hunk could always count on, it was Keith's absolute desire to find out the truth in any situation. Including the Kerberos mission, where everything went to shit, and two of Hunk's biggest idols - excluding Keith - were dead. Which, according to Keith, they really weren't and it was all just a plot to ignore what really happened. Hunk wished Keith wouldn't torture himself this way. To hold onto the hope that their friends were alive - it was too painful. It was better to let them go, to think of them in a heaven instead of stuck on a moon on the opposite side of the solar system.

It'd been over a year since the announcement that the Kerberos mission was a failure. The Garrison had blamed it on a freak meteor that crashed into the shuttle, something no one had calculated for. It was no one's fault except Mother Nature's, and it was sad, but it was just how it fell. The Garrison sent telegrams to the families of those that had been on the shuttle, including Shiro, Lance, the Holts, and three others that were there for support. It had taken Hunk four months to stop crying at the sound of Lance's name, and five months to stop feeling the sharp ache remembering Lance's smile brought.

In the time between then and now, Hunk had formed a close bond with Keith and a new guy named Pidge Gunderson. Pidge was smart - probably the smartest person Hunk knew. Pidge could code and encrypt faster than Hunk could eat. Hunk loved watching Pidge get into the coding for a new program on his computer, watching how the little guy's hands would wave reminiscent of Lance's and how his eyes would light up like Shiro's when Shiro talked about space. It was a beautiful thing, and Hunk felt lucky to know Pidge.

But Pidge had one flaw that Hunk almost had to say "enough" to: Pidge was the first person to believe the Kerberos mission's failure was a coverup for something else, that the crew was still alive. Granted, it took a while for Keith to warm up to the idea, but the seeds of doubt had been planted. Keith, after about a month of heartache, chose to believe Pidge and start a conspiracy. The two would even drag Hunk to hack into secret files and sneak out at night; but Hunk was their friend first and foremost - so while he didn't approve, he did keep his mouth shut.

It was on the eleventh month anniversary of the Kerberos crews' deaths that Keith dragged Hunk out to the roof to meet up with Pidge, who had set up his own computer and satellite to listen to "alien chatter."

"Guys," Hunk groaned, rubbing his eyes. "We have to be up at four in the morning tomorrow, let's just go back to sleep."

"You're saying that like we went to sleep in the first place," Keith grinned, plopping down next to Pidge and stealing one of his earpieces to listen in. Pidge was already fully immersed in the "alien chatter" and didn't answer.

"That's awful," Hunk moaned, thinking of his poor bed without him in it. "No sleep. Plain awful."

"Whine it up, Big Guy. But we're onto something. Look," Pidge said, holding up a notepad. Hunk had to squint at first to make sense of what he was seeing because while doodling to concentrate wasn't unheard of, doodling in all sorts of colors and styles was simply impossible to make sense of. Hunk managed to make sense of the word _Voltron_ written into every doodle after a moment of intense staring. "While I don't understand what's being said for the most part, one word keeps repeating over and over again: Voltron." Pidge set down the notebook, choosing instead to type on his computer. He unplugged his earbuds and turned up the volume, and Hunk had to frown at all of the jumbled words smashing together into a cacophony of a symphony. _Voltron_ , his mind supplied, and Hunk could hear the word muttered over and over and over. "Tonight," Pidge continued after a moment, "It's going crazier than ever before."

Keith had been silent up until now, but when he spoke it was with a guilty frown. "You remember that energy we all felt in the desert, right?" They both nodded. "Well, I managed to pinpoint its location the other day, and I followed it into these caves, with carvings all over in the shape of a lion. I haven't managed to translate it all, but I figured out that it talks about a blue lion and about something arriving on this date. I don't know about you, but this is definitely not a coincidence."

"Why didn't you tell me earlier?" Pidge demanded, and Hunk looked to the sky with a sigh. _Here we go_ -

"Holy, what is _that?_ "

Pidge and Keith looked up to Hunk's yelp, following his pointing finger to the meteor entering the atmosphere. But it was too big to be a meteor, and Pidge fished out his binoculars to take a closer look, breath held in tense anticipation. "It's a ship!" he exclaimed, and Keith snatched the binoculars from his hands, frowning as he eyed the large mass in the middle.

"We have to go," he ordered, dragging Pidge to stand and taking the computer with him, rushing to the door of the roof just as Commander Iverson's voice said over the microphone, "All Cadets back to their dorm rooms. This is not a drill -"

"Keith," Pidge yelped, scurrying to keep up on his little legs, "What are you doing?"

"We're going to meet it," Keith said determinedly.

"For the record," Hunk gasped, skidding the corner as the other two turned sharply, "This, right here, is a bad idea. I didn't agree."

"Noted," Keith said dryly.

They stopped at a hangar door, and Keith punched in a code, props to being the top Fighter Pilot Cadet in the school ( _now, since Shiro and Lance were dead_ , Hunk thought sadly). When it opened they saw Keith's personal gravity jet ready to go, covers off and everything. Hunk mourned his sleep, hopping onto the back and ignoring how it all but collapsed under him.

"Let's go," Keith said when Pidge hopped on, revving the engine and shooting out of the door just as the Garrison Humvees started up. They'd make it to the crash site first, thanks to Keith's adamant rush.

"Soooo dead," Hunk sighed, resigned to his fate to be expelled from the Garrison for breaking the rules. _Grandma is going to kill me._

The crash was a lot cleaner than Hunk expected. Sure there was a deep scar in the earth from the intense impact, but there was no debris, which was very weird. Usually, the shuttles that the Garrison sent out had debris everywhere when they landed back on Earth, _not_ crashing. "This isn't one of ours, is it?" Hunk asked, eyes trailing the smoking rut all the way to the bump in the sand.

"It's one of theirs!" Pidge yelled from in front of him.

When they rounded the bump of sand, there it was. It was at least fifteen feet wide and twenty feet tall, dark purple and sleek, not at all like the white, bulky space shuttles the Garrison sent out. This was high tech, and Hunk itched to open a lid and see the engine. "Who do you think is in it?" Keith breathed, walking boldly up to it despite Hunk's warning squeak. He knocked on the metal, hearing a dull thud, not at all like the empty clangs the Garrison shuttles usually gave.

As if in response to Keith's question, the ship hissed loudly, depressurizing to the air, and a few locks sounded. Then, almost soundlessly, a door opened to admit a bulky figure surrounded by, most likely if sci-fi movies had any reality, cryo pod gas. Hunk stumbled back a step as Pidge leaped forward, eyes intense and focused with a mad light onto the figure. Once the gas cleared, one figure became two, and Hunk couldn't breathe.

"Lance? Shiro?"


	3. Chapter 3

Keith stumbled forward on shaky legs, breath unexpectedly hard to come by. He felt like he was balancing on the edge of a cliff with a gun to his head - the only way to get out was to fall, but he was so scared of falling. "Shiro," he rasped, and suddenly he was there, taking the other half of Shiro's weight, feeling him next to him, alive and - not well but alive. Keith felt like dancing and throwing up all at once.

"Lance," he said next, just to say the forbidden name, to speak a taboo of grief and shame and anger. "Lance," he repeated, just to hear it, heart and feet light and shoulders heavy with Shiro's dead weight.

"Keith." There it was. Lance's voice penetrated Keith like a bullet. While Keith wanted to do nothing but cry in pure, unadulterated relief, he could see the lights of the Humvees getting closer. Panic curled around his throat, deathly fingers pressing and pressing -

"Where's the rest of the crew?" Pidge asked desperately, jolting forward at the distant hum of engines.

Keith looked over Shiro's head (Shiro) to eye Lance (Oh, God, Lance). The Cuban shook his head, mouth a thin line and eyes grim with grief. Pidge's shoulders dropped and then Hunk was there, shooing Pidge towards Keith's gravity jet, the pretty cherry color a dark burgundy in the night darkness. "That's my ride," Keith murmured to Lance, still dazed but quickly coming back to himself at the realization that if they didn't move right that second, it was likely this would be the last time that Keith saw his two most precious people. He grunted as he hefted Shiro's weight with Lance, wondering at their appearances - black bodysuits streamlined and fitted, purple rags over their top halves, ratty and torn, the dark mass that travelled over almost half of Lance's face, and the shine of Shiro's right arm.

He put it all behind him as he started the engine, lights and sound coming to life underneath him. Keith took a look at the Humvees in the distance, at Lance curled over Shiro and Hunk watching them with wide, awed eyes; Pidge's clear anger and fear, fingers gripping Lance's ratty shirt with white knuckles - Keith took it all in like a breath, let it go, and focused on the ground, on getting away. Desperation made his actions abrupt and chaotic, jerking the controls faster than he should, taking turns so sharp he threatened to throw everyone off. But no one said a word, too paralyzed by shock and panic to rip into Keith, to cut into him with, "You're the top pilot, you should be better!"

Keith tried to shut the clawing panic away, but with the reality of Lance and Shiro alive and with him and in danger of being taken away again -

His mind focused abruptly with determination, and he yelled, "Hunk, lean right!"

The largest male jerked his body to the right, and the gravity jet vaulted over an outcropping of rocks. Keith almost let himself smile at the sound of metal screeching, suddenly down two Humvees. Three more were close behind, but Keith was two steps ahead. His eyes alighted onto a passage in between the cliffs, small and just big enough for their jet to squeeze through, to take them into the safety of the desert.

"They're still following!" Pidge bellowed, voice high pitched and tinged with a desperation to match Keith's. Keith cursed to himself and risked a glance backwards, watching the Humvees turn and turn, jumping rocks to keep up the chase. He glanced down to the cliff and to the ground below it, sparking a thought.

"Do you trust me?" Keith shouted, and he startled when he felt a hand on his shoulder.

"Always," Lance yelled back, voice almost carried away by the rushing wind. Keith's throat clogged at Lance's immediate response, at his smooth voice and firm grip. He choked it down and jerked the jet right -

\- Everyone screamed as they shot towards the rapidly approaching ground, and Keith shouted, "Hunk, lean back!"

Hunk's weight was the only thing that kept them from going tail over head and crashing into the ground fatally. The whole jet almost touched the ground, but the pulsers kept them afloat, bouncing them upwards like a fishing float in water. As they leaped and raced forward Keith glanced backwards at the Humvees perched on the cliff, and he whooped, grinning. Lance's hand on his shoulder released and while Keith missed the warmth and reassurance it provided, he much preferred Lance to hold onto Shiro.

"That was awesome!" Pidge crowed. Hunk's choked and garbled noises disagreed and Keith could only be glad the big guy was behind him. They made the rest of the trip in relaxed silence, but Keith could feel Lance's mind turning behind him, almost audible in his distress.

When they arrived at Keith's house after three more hours of travel, they unloaded Shiro and set him on the mothball couch, coughing and gasping at the stale air. Inside smelled of dust and mould, and Hunk opened windows while Keith punched pillows to rid them of the dust mites, hitting them against his knees outside. Pidge opened the cupboards in the kitchen, shrieking as a lizard crawled over his hand.

"When's the last time you've been here?" Hunk asked, nose scrunched. Lance was quietly sitting on the couch next to Shiro's unconscious form, fingers knuckle-white against his arm, body tilted so only the left half of his face was seen watching Shiro with a deep frown.

"About a year," Keith answered absently. He fell onto his knees beside the couch, ignoring the sting, and gripped Shiro's arm. "What?" he breathed, taking in the metal, sleek and streamlined, curled fingers and heavy wrist. He looked to Lance.

"It's a long story," Lance said quietly, and Keith could see his face clearly for the first time in the light of the morning. He almost balked at the scar over Lance's right eye, angry and red and swallowing almost half of his face. His eye had all but disappeared, a slit so small it was barely there. Keith knew that he couldn't see out of it and he tried to find the blue inside of all the red.

Lance glanced downwards, face turning, and Keith knew he'd stared for too long. "We've got time," Keith said instead, grasping Lance's hand. Lance sighed heavily through his nose, and it was so reminiscent of the days before the Kerberos trip that Keith's hand tightened and his throat clogged again. He could only imagine what he would do when Shiro woke up.

Hunk plopped down next to Keith, legs crossed and sitting forward attentively, a kindergartener in his eagerness to know. He didn't bat an eye at Lance's face when Lance turned to smile at him, so small and sad but genuine. "We've definitely got time," Hunk echoed. "It should take them awhile to find a way down the cliff, and even then we were travelling for the better part of the night."

"Yeah, I want to know what happened to the rest of the crew," Pidge piped up, leaning against the back of the couch. He had taken in Lance's face and Shiro's arm and put it away, instead fishing for information.

At the mention of the crew Lance's face crumpled, and he let go of a shuddering breath. "The crew - oh, God, Matt," he gasped, and suddenly he was curled into himself, hugging himself like it was the only thing to keep him from flying apart at the seams. Keith leaped forward to tug Lance into his arms but stopped at the last second, remembering a scrunched nose and curled lip. "Keith," Lance cried, and then Keith's arms were around a shuddering Lance, gripping him close and holding him like a lifeline. Keith marvelled at the feel of touching Lance, Lance letting him be touched and held and comforted.

Pidge leaned forward attentively, eyes ravenous and mad, alighting on Lance's curled form so intently that Keith felt a shiver of fear course through him. "What happened to Matt Holt?" he demanded.

Keith braced himself, glaring up at Pidge, ready to slice him a new one -

"Pidge!" Hunk griped, fingers to his forehead. "He's a little upset right now, give him some space!" Was it Keith's imagination, or did Lance give a particularly large shudder when Hunk said 'space?'

Pidge retreated, face unhappy. "Sorry," he threw out, and Keith knew he was at least a little bit guilty when his eyes glanced to Lance and away again. "I'm going outside."

Keith and Hunk traded glances as Lance's tears slowed to a stop, grip loosening on Keith's jacket. Keith let him go when he started moving away, wiping his eyes and sniffling. "Sorry," he said through his nose, clearing his throat. Keith wanted to hug him again, just to feel how alive he was, but he held himself back with pure effort.

Hunk gave him a reassuring smile. "It's not a problem at all," he said. "It's probably super overwhelming to be back on Earth again, huh?"

Lance gave a shaky laugh, almost hysterical. "You have no idea," he said thickly, the upcurve of his lips shining like a beam of sunlight through clouds. He cleared his throat again, hands rubbing against the bags under his eyes.

"So," Hunk said conversationally as the silence stretched, "first question: How do you have short hair and no full grown beard?"

Keith and Lance blinked at him, and Keith mused to himself that that was a very valid question. He turned to Lance, eyebrows raised. Lance's fingers slid across his jaw delicately, eyes distant. "Well," he started, "it all started when an alien ship pulled us up a tractor beam on Kerberos -"

/

Katie made her way inside again after taking a walk around Keith's hideout, taking notice of the hose curled up on the side and the barred windows just poking out of the ground. It would be easy to just take a dead plant and curl up in that little space, effectively hiding away from the rest of the world - and the Garrison. Katie had a major reason to hide from the Garrison.

They'd lied about the Kerberos mission, she thought fiercely. Katie had all the proof sitting in that poor excuse for a living room.

Proof that she probably was a little too harsh with, but proof all the same. She felt a little guilty at demanding answers from an obviously distraught boy, but Katie was distraught, too - her family was still up there, and from the sounds of it, probably never coming back! That Lance guy could cry all he wanted, but Katie wanted answers first.

She entered just as Lance was describing an alien warlord known as Zarkon, and his quest to rule the universe. He told them how Zarkon wanted a weapon named Voltron - Katie gasped at the name, drawing attention to herself. She refused to flush, to bow to embarrassment, and drew herself up to say coolly, "I've been hearing that word all across the radio frequencies."

Lance nodded carefully, eyes - eye, she reminded herself, and there was that twinge of guilt and shame that she mercilessly shoved down - taking in her appearance. His face truly was the stuff of nightmares. The scar scrawled over half of his face like an inkblot, stained and never to be removed. It dragged his eye into a slit, as if someone had taken a hook to his cheekbone and pulled, hard enough to distort but not hard enough to separate from the rest of his face. He looked deformed, and to be honest with herself, if she had seen him on the street she would have crossed to the other side.

Guilt sucked.

"Yeah, it's a weapon, but I don't know what it looks like or what it does, only that he wants it," Lance continued. He shifted in his seat so Katie could see nothing but his scar, and she felt like she was watching a burned body reanimate.

"That's helpful," Keith said matter-of-factly. Lance gave him a pained smile.

"Sorry," he said sincerely, and Keith gave him a smile back.

It was weird to see Keith so friendly with someone that wasn't Hunk. Even with her Keith seemed to shield away some of himself, and they were conspiracy buddies! It hit her, just then, how badly Keith had been hurt, just as she'd been. He'd been hiding and in pain and she could relate, she still was hurt - she hurt so badly, all the time, and she wanted someone else to hurt, too, to know what she was going through. It was why she and Keith had made such good friends, she realized uncomfortably. Keith hurt just as she did -

\- and he wasn't hurting anymore. Jealousy seized Katie then, watching Keith's face as it lit up and left her in the dark. He was opening up, basking in the realization that Lance and Shiro were alive and in front of him and he could see them and touch them.

Dad! she cried internally, small and devoid of nothing but anguished want. Matt! Please come back!

Katie stared at the motheaten threads on the cotton couch she leaned against, letting the others' words wash over her. It wasn't fair. It wasn't fair, it wasn't fair, it wasn't fair. What did her family ever do to get put through this? To get taken away? Her father and brother were the kindest, gentlest people she'd ever known! Why was it that the nicest were always put through the worst?

Katie sniffled and the conversation stopped.

She refused to look up, to see all of the eyes on her, judging her, watching her fall apart -

"Hey," a soft voice said near her, and she lifted her eyes to see Lance, with his giant scar and blue eye, compassion and concern softening the harsh lines of his face. "They're okay, Katie," he said, and she crumpled, falling against that stupid couch that smelled like dust and mould. "We'll get them back. We'll get your family back."

She hoped so, as fire filled her heart just as tears cascaded down her face. Lance's hand ruffled her hair, Matt's hair, and Pidge Gunderson shook.

/

Shiro stood under the light of Sol, basking in its radiance and warmth, soaking until the cold inside of him disappeared. Earth surrounded his senses, sinking into his nose and rooting him to the ground. Gravity pulled at him familiarly, and he couldn't help but think he was dreaming.

A hand clapped his shoulder and he looked back to see Keith, eyes as bright as the morning, smiling at him like he'd come back from the dead; watery and relieved and joyed. Which, considering the Garrison told the world that he was dead, was fairly accurate. "It's good to have you back," Keith said.

Shiro sighed, looking out into the open space of an Earth desert. It was dry, drier than he remembered, but it was Earth and it was good. "It's good to be back."

They stood in silence for a few moments, Keith grounding Shiro through his hand on his shoulder. Shiro never wanted to move from this spot, viewing that blue sky reminiscent of Lance's eyes and the brown ground that looked like crushed graham crackers scattered as far as he could see.

"How are you feeling?" Keith asked, and what a loaded question that was. Shiro had to smile at Keith's familiar bluntness.

"I don't know," he admitted, looking up to that azure sky, so wide and pretty and calming. "Part of me is so relieved to be home, to be on Earth again. Another part is panicking that there are no metal walls to protect me, and another part is clamoring that they're searching for us just as hard as they're searching for Voltron."

It was silent for a moment.

"Do you know what Voltron is?" Keith asked, clearly not knowing how to respond to Shiro's depression. Shiro couldn't fault him for it, not really. "Lance said it was a weapon, but he didn't know much more than that." Keith's hand dropped to his side as he walked up to stand beside Shiro. Shiro never took his eyes off the horizon. How had he never noticed how beautiful the desert was?

"I don't know much more, unfortunately," Shiro answered, a worried frown creasing the bridge between his eyebrows. "I do know that it has five parts, but that's about it." He paused for a moment, fishing for words that scraped the edges of his mind. "I'm sorry, I can't really . . . piece it together. My mind is all fuzzy."

"Hey, it's okay," Keith calmly stated, hand clasping his shoulder again. "Don't push yourself. You've been through a lot."

"Yeah," Shiro agreed, and he turned to the house to see Lance on the steps, watching them solemnly. "Yeah, we have."

He started forward, relishing in the crunch of sand beneath his feet, of the sun beating against his back and the heavy pressure of the atmosphere, pushing to gravity's pull. He met Lance halfway and they curled into each other under the Earth's sun, under their friends' watchful gazes, eyes closed tight and reveling in being alive and still together and on Earth. Shiro would hurt for a long time, and his soul would never rest until he found Matt and Samuel, but at that precise moment, things were alright.

Things were definitely alright.


End file.
